Printing digital Nat’l IDs illegal

THE Philippine Statistics Authority (PSA) on Tuesday warned against the illegal printing of the digital Philippine Identification System (PhilSys) card or the National ID in plastic cards.

“The PSA informs the public and relying parties that the printing of the Digital National ID in polyvinyl chloride (PVC) or plastic cards is strictly prohibited,” the local statistics office said in a statement.

Only the PSA is authorized to print and issue the National ID cards, it said.

Those found guilty of illegally printing the digital National IDs will be imprisoned for up to six years and will be slapped with a fine of up to P3 million, according to the law.

Of the 89.7 million total registrations for the National ID, around 55 million have received their physical cards, PSA Assistant National Statistician Emily R. Pagador told reporters on Monday.

This leaves a 35-million backlog of physical cards yet to be delivered.

While the ID cards have yet to be printed, PhilSys registrants may avail digital versions of their IDs for government and bank transactions, PSA said.

The Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas (BSP) recently mandated all BSP-Supervised Financial Institutions to accept all forms of the National ID, including the digital version. — Beatriz Marie D. Cruz